Free Akita. Goodbye Aly. I received a call last week from an Akita owner who was ‘having problems’ with his 3 year old dog. He had called me shortly after he got her 2 years ago, as a ‘Free Akita’ from the paper. She was a year old and had been in several homes before he got her. I believe she wasn’t barking when people came to the door and she wasn’t overtly ‘friendly’ when he got home. She came up, she wagged her tail, she sniffed him and asked to be petted and then she retreated to lay down. She sounded like a nice, calm dog to me. As for the non-barking, I explained she hadn’t lived there long enough to recognize it as ‘home’ and it might be weeks or a year before she would ‘announce’ a visitor. Apparently, she never became the actively effusive dog he wanted. She was polite, accepting of visitors, the girlfriend, a new puppy. She had just turned 3 years old. He had ‘socialized’ her at the local dog park, but she was getting too dominant to continue going. She was also pulling out of the girlfriend’s hands while walked on the Flexi to jump neighborhood dogs she found annoying or offensive. Nothing fatal or by any accounts, severe. But it was scary and costly for the neighbors and irritating for the owner. She accepted the new Aussie puppy a year ago without issue and they were good friends. But when Aly got away from the girlfriend or someone wasn’t paying attention, she would run and run and run around the neighborhood and invariably reprimand an errant dog. Animal control was contacted and she was ordered to wear a muzzle when out in public. He apparently complained to Animal Control about Aly’s behavior and they offered to take her to the shelter if he signed paperwork surrendering her; they would ‘take care of her’ and it would be ‘painless’. He asked what they meant. I told him if he surrendered her to Animal Control, she would be euthanized, killed immediately. He was flabbergasted, ‘Why would they do that?’ Because, she is now a ‘Dangerous Dog’ for attacking other people’s pets and you have not proven that you can control her, nor have you taken the time to work with her or train her. ‘But she was a year old when I got her.’ SO?? Youre older. Does that mean you can’t learn anything new? ‘No, of course not.’ Then why do you think Aly can’t learn anything new? He didn’t know. He thought she had to learn training as a puppy. I told him, she was at a great age to learn obedience training. So, ‘Why was Aly doing this?’ asked the owner. He was upset that she wouldn’t come back to him when he called her. I explained that Aly was an Akita. She had never been to obedience class. (He meant to, but instead he bought the Aussie puppy.) They did not have a fenced yard (but he had contacted a fence company to come out and measure the yard and gave him a quote.). She only got walked and that was on his owner’s schedule… The girlfriend had wanted a Golden Retriever. I explained that Akitas are always the ‘Top Dog’ in multi-dog situations. She had exhibited great restraint in being able to run in a dog park. She recently turned 3 years of age. Most Akitas become territorial at age 3,and are less tolerant of other dogs they: they now ‘draw the line’ and those that don’t respect it or have ticked off the Akita are targeted for reprisal. As for her running away and not returning I explained that Akitas are a hunting breed…they generally don’t return until they find their game. If he wanted a dog with high owner response, he should have gotten the Golden. We revisited obedience class, getting the yard securely fenced, losing the Flexi and using a 6’ lead and wearing the muzzle while out in public. I asked the owner to bring her to me this weekend to evaluate her and then I could go meet her on her territory. I felt if she was truly unhappy with him, we would list her on our courtesy page, unless there was something else going on. But as of this conversation, she sounded like a normal Akita. The owner did not call me Friday. I ended up going out on another rescue that ran longer than expected on Saturday, but called him Sunday She got loose again when her owner thought he had put a lead on her and he hadnt...he was taking both dogs out for a walk. Aly took off. AC was called and they finally caught her. Her owner was disgusted by the incident and surrendered her to the County and they euthanized her as soon as they got back to AC. He then regretted his decision, called to retrieve her but she was gone. He said he felt so bad, he would go buy a puppy and ‘do things different so the puppy wouldn’t turn out like Aly’. He was still blaming Aly for being a failure. He called a breeder in TX. I dont know who it was but I could have kissed him – he told the owner the same thing we would have told him - DONT get another Akita. He told him there was no guarantee that the dog would grow up and love all dogs or behave any better than poor untrained Aly. He reiterated to the owner, that all Akitas when they turn 3 years, get increasingly more territorial. The owner said he felt terrible about what happened to Aly. I couldn’t help myself, I told him Aly felt worse. Her punishment was death.
Posted on: Thu, 14 Nov 2013 03:29:35 +0000
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